Our Opinion: Don't get fooled again with tobacco tax hike

Our Opinion: Don't get fooled again with tobacco tax hike

May 2nd, 2012 in News

Instead of a petition campaign to raise Missouri's cigarette tax, health organizations should petition lawmakers to redirect the tobacco settlement funds they diverted.

A number of health groups in the state are promoting an initiative petition campaign that would ask voters to increase tobacco taxes, including a 73-cent hike for a pack of cigarettes, now taxed at 17 cents.

The proposal is designed to channel increased tobacco tax revenue to smoking prevention and cessation programs.

Smoking is and expensive and unhealthy habit. Avoiding or quitting smoking is perhaps the single greatest step toward a healthy lifestyle.

In addition, Missouri's 17-cent-a-pack cigarette tax is the lowest in the nation; the national average is $1.46 a pack.

Our concern is such an effort would be well under way if Missouri officials had not diverted millions of dollars from a court settlement intended precisely for that purpose.

A legal settlement is not intended to be a windfall, it is intended as compensation for damages. Missouri, however, subverted that intention.

According to the Campaign For Tobacco-Free Kids, Missouri has allocated $60,000 for tobacco prevention in fiscal year 2012, less than 0.1 percent of the $244 million it will receive from settlement payments and tobacco taxes.

The proposed initiative petition would ask voters to approve a law, not a constitutional amendment.

A law is preferable, because tax rates should not be enshrined in the Constitution.

Voter-approved laws, however, can be altered by the Legislature, as evidenced by the legislative changes to the voter-approved Proposition B animal welfare regulations.

Consequently, lawmakers would have power to amend the voter-approved initiative, just as they diverted tobacco-settlement funds.